Melody
by Fannin
Summary: Short companion fiction to 'Leaves in the Wind' Soothing, gentle... Chimes sounding noiselessly on a winter day. Years ago, the Harogami brothers recieved a gift from their clan and soon after, they listen to the leaves fall in silence.


**Author Note:** This is a short fiction that features two original characters from Leaves in the Wind, Harogami Kuro and Harogami Kuro. You may not understand it unless you've read LitW. For those of you who love our two not-so-evil bad-guys, you'll enjoy this.

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**Melody**

Always, as winter opened its gapping mouth and breathed over the earth, the air grew colder and the birds fled to roost in some land beyond, leaving silent mornings in their wake. It swallowed the sun so that days grew shorter under a hazy sky. Yet regardless of pressing time, the bareness of the trees was still hidden between thick green. It seemed to some that Konoha's woods would never weary, regardless of season. Konoha, a city of life, appeared eternal to its citizens. To those who protected them as they worked, however, it granted a strong sense of mortality. They could see their lives ebbing and falling as leaves, not to be resurrected in the Spring but to crack and shrivel as their bodies either lay buried in the dirt or bent to an unknown fate.  
The younger shinobi attempted to understand, but most of them became lost in the promise of blooming flowers and waves of green; they did not chance to see beyond the spring and summer to the autumn and winter that would follow. Most of them did not care. They were, if not inexperienced, as addicted to life as they were to battle.  
Few defied this way of thought.  
"The leaves are ugly. See? On that one, they're turning brown."  
These people stubbornly continued to exist.  
Two children wandered, weaving around the trees on foot, quickly plodding through layers of grass and fallen foliage, hand in hand. One inspected their surroundings critically and the other, with a less daunting golden eye. He glanced back cautiously at the tiny chimes swinging noiselessly from the string in his hair. When at first they had been affixed to their ceremoniously worn hair bands, both boys had enjoyed the constant brassy echo of chimes- but as day after day of flat air surfaced, their academy Sensei grew irritable and told them to take them out.  
The man had been promptly pinned with kunai piercing his shoulder.  
It took two long weeks for the academy sensei to understand what kept the chimes ringing.  
Harogami Kuro and Harogami Kuro had been immediately tossed to the Hokkage's scarred minion.  
'_Death chimes'.  
'Death chimes', the sensei whispered. 'Why were you given these devices?'  
Why?  
'Clan tradition.' Brave, younger Kuro would speak for his brother.  
'What clan?'  
'We swore allegiance to Konoha one generation ago. We have been living here as medical ninja since then.'  
'What clan?'  
Eventually, the Third had met and spoke with them privately. He said very little; a majority of the time he had merely sat silently, head slightly tilted as though listening beyond the chiming or perhaps, into the impossibly complex melody no small brass chime like those were ever physically able to create.  
'You can hear the deaths of everyone around you in these chimes.'  
Elder Kuro did not fully understand.  
'Yes.' Younger Kuro always spoke for him…  
'This is a part of your clan's abilities?'  
'Yes.'  
'And you require it to be sealed?'  
'Yes.'  
'I see...you are correct in your decision. These chimes should no longer be heard.'  
_ And now here they were, within the Konoha forests, far away from the academy with chimes quietly swinging behind them.  
"We can hear them if we want to, Kuro-kun."  
"But Hokkage-sama said-"  
Kuro sounded almost emphatic. "What about the Hokkage? What's he got he got that I don't got?"  
"A brain," So the elder retorted with a half hearted glare; they shared the same face but he could never pull himself into the form of a cold, aloof shinobi. It was disappointing and sorely…vexing… "And the highest concentration of chakara in all of Konoha."  
"Don't care. You don't need chakara to be the greatest ninja."  
"But Hokkage-sama said…Hokkage-sama said…"  
"Stupid."  
Both children descended speech and walked the path in silence.  
Abrupt movement in the trees signified someone passing by, branch to branch and as both glanced up, they locked gazes for a brief second in time.  
One gray eye observed them both, the other they could not see beneath the mask.  
Elder Kuro breathed in- the boy was gone.  
Behind him, came the sudden gentle music of a chime.  
"Brother-?"  
He pivoted on his heels to face a grin.  
"That was Hatake Kakashi."  
"Why were…why were the chimes ringing?"  
A heavy pause fell over them and very slowly, younger Kuro turned his back to his sibling. "Because death is waiting."  
Elder Kuro accepted this-  
And they both moved on.


End file.
